Ahh, the BlackBerry PlayBook. The tablet might be struggling when it comes to sales (it was beaten last quarter by Windows 7 tablets), but the hardware itself is solid and it’s got oodles of potential. And thanks to a bit of digging by an inquisitive BlackBerry enthusiast, some more of that potential is about to be unlocked.

Back in May, RIM demoed one of the PlayBook’s more intriguing and unique upcoming features: the ability to run Android apps via a virtual machine. BlackBerry Tablet OS updates have come and gone with nary a hint of Android support trickling down, but now it’s apparent that RIM is very, very close.

Fortunately, those of you who own a PlayBook don’t have to wait if you don’t want to: the Android Player app for BlackBerry Tablet OS has been leaked.

The installer was found hidden within the changelog for the latest BlackBerry Desktop Manager update. If you own a PlayBook, you can download the Android Player .BAR installer right now — just be aware that this isn’t an official RIM release. You’d be getting it from App World or as a downloadable update if it was “certified.”

The Android Player for PlayBook has to be sideloaded, but the process is fairly simple. Just clear some time in your schedule and head on over to the BerryReview forums for full details.

N4BB’s post doesn’t actually show any Android apps running on the PlayBook, but you can watch RIM’s demo video from BlackBerry World 2011 to get a feel for how the magic happens.